An Eclectic Journal of Opinion, History, Poetry and General Bloviating

Friday, August 30, 2013

The Brown Face of Vietnam War Protest

L.A. Country Sheriff Deputy prepares to fire a round of tear gas canister directly into the Silver Dollar Bar which will strike reporter Ruben Salezar in the head, killing him instantly.

We tend to put a pretty white faceon the Anti-War Movement of
the ‘60’s and ‘70’s.Whether we conjure
images of student and hippy protestors, older Ban the Bomb demonstrators out for a
new round of activism, the ladies of the Another
Mother for Peace crowd, or the respectable middle class that began to turn
out with the Moratorium, the faces
we imagine are uniformly white ones.

Even the demonsratable contributions
to the movement by people of color like Martin
Luther King’s firmly stated opposition to the War in Vietnam tend to be obscured because we compartmentalize him
with Civil Rights and non-violence.The rising militancy of all kinds of
minority and disadvantaged groups in the late ‘60’s is viewed as something
apart from the anti-war movement.

But out West the Chicano Moratorium put a Brown face on war protest.The Chicano Moratorium had its roots in East Los Angeles high schools where
students organized walk out protests to the war and military recruiting on
campus in 1968.The students quickly
drew the support of the Brown Berets, a
militant Chicano—Mexican-American—movement
modeled on the Black Panthers.The Brown Berets were part of the loose
coalition of such organizations that included Puerto Rican Young Lords in Chicago
and New York, the American Indian Movement (AIM), and attempts to organize working
class white kids by Rising Up Angry in
Chicago and the White Panthers in Detroit.

By 1969 the L.A. students and the
Brown Berets had organized the National
Chicano Moratorium Committee (NCMC).Soon groups from throughout the West were
joining or lending their support, including Crusade for Justice, led by
Rodolfo “Corky” Gonzales which was headquartered in Denver and active in Chicago as well.A national organizing conference was held in
early December at the Crusade’s Denver office which issued calls for
demonstrations against the war and for a national Chicano youth conference the
following May.

The first demonstration under the
Chicano Moratorium banner was held in East
L.A. on December 20 and attracted over 1,000 marchers.A second demonstration on February 28, 1970
drew more than three times that number despite a pouring rain storm.A local PBS
documentary about that demonstration was used to spread word about the
movement and organize new affiliates.

At the May youth conference
Moratorium Co-Chair Rosalio Muno presented
the resolution that called for a National
Chicano Moratorium March in East L.A. for August 29 with supporting demonstrations
in other cities.On that date there were
more than 20 demonstrations, most with at least a thousand participants in
cities including Houston, Albuquerque, Chicago, Denver, Fresno, San Francisco, San Diego, Oakland, Oxnard, San Fernando, San Pedro and Douglas, Arizona.

Of course the largest demonstration
of all was in Los Angeles where participants from as far away as New York City, Mexico, and Puerto Rico joined
local activists.An estimated 30,000
marchers set off that day on a march from Belvedere Park to Laguna Park where a stage and
speakers’ platform had been erected for a rally.

Shortly
after leading elements of the march were settling down in front of the stage, Los
Angeles Police (LAPD), who had a history of attacks on the Chicano community,
began dropping tear gas from helicopters and moving into the park with batons
swinging.They claimed that a robbery of
a nearby liquor store had been committed by demonstrators.March monitors and parade marshals resisted
the move into the park but the marchers were soon forced back out onto the
parade route, Whittier Boulevard
and into the surrounding neighborhood.

Demonstrators began throwing tear
gas grenades back at the police and some broke away overturning cars and
setting fire to businesses.Street
fighting continued for more than an hour.When it was over scores were injured, over 150 were arrested, and four
were dead.The dead were Gustav Montag, Lyn Ward, José Diaz and Rubén Salazar.

Montag, a Sephardic Jewish activist marching in
support of the Chicano movement was deliberately targeted by police in an ally
confrontation when officers armed with rifles opened fire on him at short range
when he allegedly picked up something to throw at them.

The death of Salazar, probably Los
Angeles’ best know Mexican-American
journalist drew the greatest public attention.He was a 42 year old award winning reporter
and columnist for the Los Angeles Times and News Director at the Spanish language
T.V. station KMEX who had served as
a war correspondent in Vietnam.Since
returning stateside he had covered the growing Chicano movement and on rampant
police brutality in Los Angeles.

As the street disturbances wound
down police fired teargas canisters from their shotguns directly into the Silver Dollar Bar where Sanchez had
taken refuge.He was sitting at the bar,
sipping a cold beer.The teargas round
was not the usual anti-personnel canister, but round designed to pierce walls in
barricade situations.Sanchez was hit in
the head and died instantly.Some
believe he was intentionally targeted.Others believe he was just unlucky.

As the prominent Chicana poetAlurista observed after the fact, “The police called it a people's
riot; the people called it a police riot.”

A Federal Attorney brought charges against the police officer that
fired the fatal round at Sanchez, but they were dropped after President Richard Nixon fired him.

Tensions in L.A.remained high.Over the following year there were numerous
demonstrations and school walk-outs.Arrests
were common and beatings of Chicano suspects routine.The offices of the Chicano Moratorium were
marked for harassment. In November 9 activists were arrested as they left the
Moratorium office.By December it was
closed.

Demonstrations continued in Los
Angeles and around the West, but the Chicano Moratorium faded away over the
next year or two, most of its leaders joining the ranks of La Raza and other groups.

Eventually Laguna Park, site of the
rally, was re-named by the city for Rubén
Salazar.The United States Postal Service even included him in a 2005 set of
stamps honoring American journalists.But outside of L.A and the Latino community, Salazar is largely
forgotten and the other dead sunk in greater anonymity.

Lest we believe that the tensions
between the police and Latino residents is a thing of the distant past, the
events of August 29, 1970 were echoed on May
Day 2007 when a huge crowd of immigration
reform marchers were attacked by the LAPD with rubber bullets, tear gas and
batons.Despite the orderly nature of
the crowd, which was quite festive and included many children, police charged
the rally inside McArthur Park because
some on the edge had been blocking the street.Dozens were injured.

And police once again seemed to
specifically target the press who were documenting the abuse.Sanjukta
Paul, a female National Lawyers
Guild observer, was severely beaten.Reporters Christina Gonzalez of
KTTVFox 11 News, Pedro Sevcec
ofTelemundo’s
National Evening News, local CBS reporter Mark Coogan and his cameraman Carl
Stein, Patricia Nazario of KPCC, KABC-TV reporter Sid Garcia,
and Patti Ballaz, a camerawoman for KTTV were all injured by police.Garcia was struck by a rubber bullet.

Despite this, footage of the attack
made national news.The city launched
investigations and at least one high ranking officer was relieved of command.